2010/04/11: Guardian(UK): Climate aid threat to countries that refuse to back Copenhagen accordDeveloping nations claim they are being offered cash to sign up to climate change dealRich countries have threatened to cut vital aid to the developing nations if they do not back the deal agreed at the UN climate summit in Copenhagen, it has emerged. The pressure on poor countries to support the US, EU and UK-brokered Copenhagen accord came as 190 countries resumed UN climate talks in Bonn in an atmosphere of mutual suspicion.

2010/04/09: Reuters: China, U.S. clash over 2010 U.N. climate talksThe United States and China clashed on Friday about how to revive climate talks in 2010, complicating the first U.N. session since the acrimonious Copenhagen summit fell short of agreeing a treaty. Many delegates at the 175-nation talks in Bonn from April 9-11 urged efforts to restore trust between rich and poor countries but few held out hopes for a breakthrough deal to fight global warming at the next major talks in Cancun, Mexico, in late 2010. In a split between the world’s top two emitters of greenhouse gases, Washington said it wanted talks in 2010 to build on a non-binding Copenhagen Accord for limiting global warming reached by more than 110 nations at the December summit. Beijing insisted negotiations should be guided by other draft U.N. texts and said Premier Wen Jiabao had been “vexed” at one point in Copenhagen by the way the meetings were organized in small groups.

2010/04/09: BBC: Climate ‘more urgent than ever’The need for a new global climate deal is “greater than ever”, according to developing country delegates speaking at the opening of UN climate talks. Blocs representing the poorest nations called for intensive talks during the year, leading to agreement on a legally binding treaty in December. The EU backed the call, re-stating that the conclusion of December’s Copenhagen summit had not met its ambitions. But other industrialised countries do not appear so keen for a new treaty. The three-day meeting here in Bonn is the first since the Copenhagen summit concluded without the global treaty that many countries had aimed for, instead producing a political declaration known as the Copenhagen Accord.

2010/04/08: BBC: Climate deal fear as talks resumeThe first round of UN climate talks since December’s bitter Copenhagen summit opens in Bonn on Friday with the future of the process uncertain. Developing countries are adamant that the UN climate convention is the right forum for negotiating a global deal and want it done by the year’s end. But others, notably the US, appear to think this is not politically feasible. Some delegates are concerned that the whole process could collapse, given the divisions and lack of trust.

2010/04/09: Guardian(UK): British campaigner urges UN to accept ‘ecocide’ as international crimeProposal to declare mass destruction of ecosystems a crime on a par with genocide launched by lawyerA campaign to declare the mass destruction of ecosystems an international crime against peace – alongside genocide and crimes against humanity – is being launched in the UK. The proposal for the United Nations to accept “ecocide” as a fifth “crime against peace”, which could be tried at the International Criminal Court (ICC), is the brainchild of British lawyer-turned-campaigner Polly Higgins. The radical idea would have a profound effect on industries blamed for widespread damage to the environment like fossil fuels, mining, agriculture, chemicals and forestry. Supporters of a new ecocide law also believe it could be used to prosecute “climate deniers” who distort science and facts to discourage voters and politicians from taking action to tackle global warming and climate change.

2010/04/09: BBC: ‘World needs a barometer of life’The world needs a “barometer of life” to prevent ecosystems and species being lost forever, scientists have warned. Existing schemes, they said, did not include enough species from groups such as fungi and invertebrates to provide a detailed picture of what is at risk. Writing in the journal Science, the researchers said the barometer would increase the number of species being assessed from almost 48,000 to 160,000.

2010/04/09: Guardian(UK): World Bank’s $3.75bn coal plant loan defies environment criticismUS, Britain, the Netherlands, Italy and Norway abstain from vote in protestThe World Bank approved a controversial $3.75bn loan to build one of the world’s largest coal plants in South Africa yesterday, defying international protests and sharp criticism from the Obama administration that the project would fuel climate change. The proposed Medupi station, operated by South Africa’s state-owned Eskom company, was fiercely opposed by an international coalition of grassroots, church and environmental activists who said it would hurt the environment and do little to help end poverty. As planned, tIt would put out 25 tonnes of carbon dioxide a year and would prevent South Africa making good on a promise to try to curb future emissions.

2010/04/06: NYT: South Africa Energy Needs Collide With U.S. PolicyThe Obama administration, caught in an awkward bind between its own ambitions on climate change and Africa’s pressing energy needs, is facing the first test of its new guidelines discouraging coal-fired power projects in developing nations. This week, the World Bank will vote on a $3.75 billion loan to South Africa, most of it to help build the world’s seventh-largest coal plant. The bank’s own experts concede that the giant plant will “produce large quantities of carbon dioxide that will contribute to global climate change.” But the bank’s largest shareholder — the United States — has enacted guidelines to push for “no or low carbon” ways of meeting the energy needs of developing nations that rely on international financial institutions.

2010/04/04: VoxEU: Expert fiddling by Stuart MacdonaldRecent allegations that scientists at the Climate Research Unit have hidden and manipulated data has caused a media storm. This column argues that the practices alleged in “climategate” may be more common in academia than we think.

2010/04/08: TStar: Canadian smart sub ready for Arctic seaThe cutting-edge smart sub built to help define Canada’s Arctic borders is set for her first, and one of her most treacherous, missions: She has to find her way to work.[…]Canada has until 2013 to submit evidence in support of its Arctic territorial claim to the United Nations. Under the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea, countries can claim territory beyond the normal limit of 200 kilometres from shore for as far as the continental shelf extends unbroken. Called the extended continental shelf, it is estimated to be as large as 1.75 million square kilometres, or an area the size of three Prairie provinces, in Canada’s Arctic and Atlantic Oceans, where Natural Resources Canada is mapping the seafloor in a hurry to meet the 2013 deadline.

2010/04/08: BBC: Legal fight over hunger wonder-productShould a revolutionary humanitarian food product be protected by commercial patent, when lifting restrictions might save millions of starving children? That is the moral conundrum at the heart of a bitter transatlantic legal dispute. On one side are the French inventors of Plumpy’nut, a peanut paste which in the last five years has transformed treatment of acute malnutrition in Africa. Nutriset, the Normandy-based company, says the patent is needed to safeguard production of Plumpy’nut in the developing world, and to stop the market being swamped by cheap US surpluses. And on the other hand are two American not-for-profit organisations that have filed a suit at a Washington DC federal court to have the patent overturned. They say they are being stopped by Nutriset from manufacturing similar – and cheaper – peanut-based food products, despite the proven demand from aid agencies.

2010/04/08: BBC: Kenyan GM maize shipment blockedA shipment of genetically modified (GM) maize has been blocked at the Kenyan port of Mombasa after protests by environmentalists. The cargo came from South Africa – whose maize exports mainly go to Kenya – and contained maize varieties developed by US multinational Monsanto. Protestors claimed that safety checks had not been carried out on the maize and that it could contaminate the soil. GM imports have been banned in several African countries. The 40,000-tonne shipment contained four varieties of maize, three of which were made by Monsanto.

2010/04/07: CNN: Atlantic may see above-average hurricane seasonUniversity forecasters predict the 2010 Atlantic hurricane season will be above average, with 15 named storms and eight of those becoming hurricanes. The Colorado State University report was released Wednesday, nearly two months before the beginning of the Atlantic hurricane season on June 1. In the report, forecasters William Gray and Phil Klotzbach said that El Niño conditions will dissipate by summer and that unusually warm tropical Atlantic sea surface temperatures will persist, leading to favorable conditions for hurricanes to develop and intensify.

2010/04/06: CBC: Calgary among world’s highest CO2 emittersCalgary produces more carbon dioxide per person in an urban setting than smog-filled Mexico City or New York City, according to a report by the United Nations. Going by new international measuring standards, Calgary produces 17.7 tonnes of carbon dioxide per capita, ranking it fifth-highest in a comparison of 50 global cities. Toronto and Vancouver, the only other Canadian cities surveyed, had emissions of 9.5 tonnes and 4.9 tonnes, respectively. That brings them near the middle of the pack, along with Tokyo and Mexico City.

2010/04/02: Oregonian: Most Oregon greenhouse gas not what you might thinkAn inventory conducted by Metro concludes that driving our cars and heating our homes aren’t the region’s biggest sources of greenhouse gas emissions. It’s how we make, move and toss away all the stuff we consume. According to the inventory, manufacturing products and food, moving freight and managing waste produce an estimated 14.9 million metric tons of greenhouse gases annually, or 48 percent of the emissions produced in the tri-county Portland area. Natural gas and fossil fuels account for 27 percent, and emissions from transit, cars and light trucks accounts make up 25 percent of the total. “Consumption matters as much as energy and transportation,” the report concludes.

2010/04/04: Reuters: Arctic thaw frees overlooked greenhouse gas: studyThawing permafrost can release nitrous oxide, also known as laughing gas, a contributor to climate change that has been largely overlooked in the Arctic, a study showed on Sunday. The report [by Bo Elberling et al.] in the journal Nature Geoscience indicated that emissions of the gas surged under certain conditions from melting permafrost that underlies about 25 percent of land in the Northern Hemisphere. Emissions of the gas measured from thawing wetlands in Zackenberg in eastern Greenland leapt 20 times to levels found in tropical forests, which are among the main natural sources of the heat-trapping gas.

2010/04/05: BizStd: Climate change already killing 150,000 a year in low-income economies: WHOClimate change has begun to affect human health, leading to a rise in cases related to stomach ailments and vector-borne diseases like malaria and dengue. This has been indicated in a report in the recent bulletin of the World Health Organisation (WHO). The apex global health body reckons that about 150,000 deaths occur annually in low-income countries due to the adverse effects of climate change, chiefly malnutrition due to climate change-driven crop failures, stomach diseases and malaria. The report says that the rise in atmospheric temperature and sea levels, coupled with extreme weather events, notably higher frequency of floods, cause water logging and water contamination, leading to higher incidence of diarrhoeal ailments. The geographical spread of vector-borne diseases such as malaria and dengue is also projected to increase. Besides, the dynamics of communicable diseases may undergo a change, WHO has cautioned. The poorer countries will be affected relatively more because of their deficient health systems and paucity of resources.

2010/04/05: EarthTimes: Six-million-dollar fine for destroying Amazon rainforestRio de Janeiro – A farmer in the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso was fined 6.15 million dollars for destroying 2,234 hectares of the Amazon rainforest, Brazilian authorities said Monday. Sources at the Brazilian Institute for the Environment and Human Resources (IBAMA) told the news website G1 that the deforestation happened near the town of Nova Ubirata, some 500 kilometres from Mato Grosso capital Cuiaba, and in an area close to the indigenous and nature reserve of the Xingu National Park.

2010/03/28: IndiaTimes: Himalayan glaciers shrank 16% in 50 yrs: ISROHimalayan glaciers retreated by 16% in the last nearly five decades due to climate change, investigations by India’s scientists in selected basins in four states has revealed. The retreat of Himalayan glaciers and loss in a real extent were monitored in selected basins in J&K, Himachal Pradesh, Uttaranchal and Sikkim, under a programme on space-based global climate change observation by Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).

2010/04/05: Google:AP: Study: Northeast seeing more, fiercer rainstormsThe Northeast is seeing more frequent “extreme precipitation events” in line with global warming predictions, a study shows, including storms like the recent fierce rains whose floodwaters swallowed neighborhoods and businesses across New England. The study does not link last week’s devastating floods to its research but examined 60 years’ worth of National Weather Service rainfall records in nine Northeastern states and found that storms that produce an inch or more of rain in a day — a threshold the recent storm far surpassed — are coming more frequently.

2010/04/11: Scotsman: Climate expert [John Houghton] vows to fight the ‘naysayers’One of Britain’s most distinguished climate scientists is taking legal action to silence an internet campaign against him. Sir John Houghton has accused sceptics of waging a dirty tricks campaign to spread uncertainty about the state of global warming research. He hopes to use a talk at the Edinburgh International Science Festival this week to fight back against climate change “naysayers”.

2010/04/07: EarthTimes: US climate researcher James Hansen wins Norwegian prizeOslo – US climate researcher James E Hansen was Wednesday named winner of the annual Sophie Prize for helping improve “understanding of human-induced climate change” and its potential threat to the planet. Hansen, 69, was lauded by the jury for combining “research with political activism based on personal conviction” despite criticism and even censorship of his findings during the administration of former US president George W Bush. He has also called for phasing out coal mining and letting fossil fuel reserves remain untapped.

2010/04/07: EUO: EU suggests 50 billion euro bank tax ideaThe European Commission has published a study which suggests a new tax on banks could generate as much as 50 billion euros a year for EU governments, whose public finances have been left in tatters following the recent financial crisis. The EU tax on bank leverage and risk-taking is just one of several “innovative financing options” in the commission document, published on Tuesday (6 April), with the region’s finance ministers set to mull over the list at an informal meeting in Madrid this month. As well as helping governments improve their balance sheets, the fresh revenue could be used to fund future bank bail-outs, climate change and development goals, say the report’s authors, with Germany and France broadly in support of the plans.

2010/04/05: CanWest: Global bank tax could be awkward at G20 — Flaherty opts for lighter touchMomentum is building among some of the world’s richest countries for a global tax on banks, a trend that could give the Conservatives headaches as Canada prepares to host the G20 summit this June. Last week, Germany added its name to the list of countries backing an international levy on financial institutions. The Germans are proposing that banks be required to pay $1.6 billion every year into an insurance fund that could be used to bail out the financial system in the event of another crisis.

2010/04/07: PlanetArk: Public Supports Energy Over Environment: PollFor the first time in 10 years Americans are more likely to say the United States should give more priority to developing oil, natural gas and coal than to protecting the environment, according to a poll on Tuesday. The poll was conducted a few weeks before President Barack Obama announced he would open offshore oil drilling in some parts the U.S. East Coast, Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico.

2010/04/07: TerraDaily: Mekong River Commission addresses droughtOfficials from Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos — member countries of the Mekong River Commission — called for greater cooperation from China in managing the Mekong River. The four countries signed a declaration Monday pledging to intensify cooperation to better manage the Mekong and reduce risks from floods and drought. But they expressed concern over eight dams China has planned along the river in southwestern Yunnan province, the Hindu newspaper reports.

2010/04/05: BBC: China rejects Mekong dam claimsChina has rejected claims that its dams on the Mekong River are to blame for record low water levels in downstream nations. Speaking at a summit in Thailand, China’s vice foreign minister said drought and not hydropower was to blame for the reduced river flow. More than 60m people from Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam depend on the Mekong River for their livelihoods. Parts of the river are at their lowest levels in 50 years. Further downstream drought, salt deposits and reduced soil nutrients are threatening food production in the rice bowls of Cambodia and Vietnam.

2010/04/07: NYT: Texas Oil Firms Oppose California Climate LawSeveral Texas oil companies are bankrolling a petition drive to suspend California’s path-breaking climate change law in a move that may prove a bellwether for national efforts to address global warming. The Valero Energy Corporation, a San Antonio-based company that is one of the nation’s largest independent oil refiners and retailers, has contributed $500,000 to a ballot initiative that would halt the carrying out of the California climate law known as Assembly Bill 32, which Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican, signed in 2006. At least one other Texas oil company, Tesoro, with operations in California and a prominent antitax group are helping to finance the petition drive to place the initiative on the November general election ballot. The California law, the first of its kind in the nation, is intended to reduce emissions of climate-altering gases by 15 percent below current levels by 2020 through a variety of means, including a regional cap-and-trade system. The bill also calls for greater efficiencies in buildings and transportation, more use of renewable sources of energy and greater reliance on clean-burning fuels. These are all major elements of climate change proposals now being discussed in Washington. The fine points of the California plan, including the critical questions of how emissions permits would be allocated and how any revenues would be distributed, are still being worked out. The ballot initiative would prevent the law’s taking effect until unemployment in California falls to 5.5 percent or lower for four consecutive quarters. The state’s current unemployment rate is 12.5 percent. The average statewide unemployment rate in 2006 was 4.9 percent.

2010/04/04: S&R: CAFE sucksThis week saw a fine example of political gamesmanship from the Obama administration. He let down his base yet again by opening up certain portions of the U.S. coast to offshore petroleum drilling in an attempt to undercut his (supposed) foes across the aisle, and upped CAFE standards. The former has gotten a lot more press than the latter. Neither are quite what they seem.

2010/04/07: NYT:GW: GAO Audit: MMS Withheld Offshore Drilling Data, Hindered Risk Analyses in AlaskaThe Minerals Management Service has withheld information from regional staff in Alaska and has not had sufficient guidelines in place to analyze offshore drilling risks in the region, a government audit shows. The Government Accountability Office found that MMS’s Alaska OCS Region shares information selectively, against agency policy, which directs that information — including proprietary data from industry — be shared with all staff involved in environmental reviews.

2010/04/06: Reuters: Climate bill sets oil “rack” transport taxDetails of an oil industry tax are being filled in Congress as part of an upcoming U.S. climate control bill, sparking a spirited lobbying campaign this week over how the revenues from that tax would be used. A Senate source familiar with the draft legislation told Reuters that the new fee “will be assessed at the terminal rack,” — where refined oil products await shipment to retail gasoline stations and other end points. But the source added that no final decisions had yet been made on whether revenues from the tax would be deposited into the Highway Trust Fund and whether they would be earmarked for specific “green” projects or road and bridge repairs that the highway fund normally handles.

2010/04/08: PlanetArk: Firms Urge Obama To Offer Consumer Energy InfoAlmost 50 U.S. firms and organizations, including Google, General Electric and AT&T, urged President Barack Obama on Tuesday to let consumers know how much energy they use so they can decide where to cut back. This could “unleash the forces of innovation in homes and businesses … reduce greenhouse gas emissions and save consumers billions of dollars,” the group of 47 companies and organizations said in a letter to Obama.

2010/04/08: SolveClimate: 7 AGs Urge Congress to Preserve States’ Greenhouse Gas AuthoritySeven more state attorneys general jumped into the climate debate this week, this time arguing that any climate legislation must preserve the progress that states have made so far and not restrict their ability to keep pushing the envelope. Individual states have led the way on auto standards, emissions targets, renewable energy portfolio standards, land use measures, reporting requirements, and building and appliance efficiency standards, among other energy and environmental rules. They launched the first carbon trading program in the country with the Northeast’s Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). These programs are working, the chief lawyers for California, Massachusetts, Vermont, Maine, Maryland, Rhode Island and Delaware write in a letter to members of Congress.

2010/04/08: BBC: Price of petrol hits record highThe average price of unleaded petrol has hit a new high of 119.9p a litre, analysts Experian Catalist have said. Prices have been increasing steadily since the end of last year as the pound has weakened, which makes imported fuel more expensive. The previous record was 119.7p, reached in July 2008 when the price of oil peaked at $147 a barrel.

2010/04/06: Scotsman: ‘Cheated’ for going green too early[…]…the Clean Energy Cashback system will pay 27p for every unit of electricity generated by a small wind turbine. But the new payments — also called Feed-in Tariffs — will only be paid to householders who installed green technology after 15 July 2009.

2010/04/07: EarthTimes: EU to coordinate forest protection policiesSegovia, Spain – European Union forest experts on Wednesday urged the 27-nation bloc to coordinate forest protection policies, an area which the Spanish EU presidency described as lagging behind other sectors. There was “little common policy” in forest protection, Spanish environment official Josep Puxeu said at an EU-sponsored meeting of some 200 experts in Granja de San Ildefonso near the Spanish city of Segovia. The meeting approved a document which will be submitted to EU environment ministers in June, recommending the creation of a coordination mechanism to step up the exchange of information and to adopt measures against the degradation of forest areas.

2010/04/06: ABC(Au): Townsville in ‘smart grid’ bidTownsville Enterprise Limited (TEL) says north Queensland would be in the international spotlight when it comes to energy efficiency if the Federal Government chooses the city to host a smart grid initiative. TEL spokeswoman Lisa McDonald says the Federal Government has short-listed Townsville as one of three cities to trial the program which will trial ways to best reduce power consumption in homes and businesses. She says the successful host city will be announced at the end of the month.

2010/04/06: ABC(Au): Turnbull walks away with swipe at AbbottFormer Opposition leader Malcolm Turnbull has announced he is quitting federal politics at the next election. Mr Turnbull, who lost the Liberal leadership in December, ended the speculation about his future by announcing his decision in a statement on his website today.

2010/04/08: EarthTimes: ‘Asian voice’ needed on climate change, experts urgeBeijing – Asian nations must unite and create an “Asian voice” on global efforts to combat climate change, regional experts said on Thursday. “The Asian region is a very important part of the solution and we have a large stake,” Suwit Khunkitti, the Thai Minister of Natural Resources and Environment, said at a forum on climate change in Beijing. Suwit said he hoped the two-day forum would “help to create an Asian platform, an Asian voice” on climate change.

2010/04/08: CanWest: Feds investigate oil resources in Arctic region ‘teeming with wildlife’It was hailed just four months ago by Environment Minister Jim Prentice as one of Canada’s “richest ecological areas” when he announced a landmark $5-million study aimed at declaring it a National Marine Conservation Area. But while one branch of the federal government has moved to protect Nunavut’s Lancaster Sound as a one-of-a-kind natural treasure – “an area of incredible beauty that is teeming with wildlife,” according the region’s Conservative MP Leona Aglukkaq – the Geological Survey of Canada has confounded environmentalists and local communities by planning a seismic seabed survey this summer to probe for potential oil and gas deposits in the beluga and narwhal-rich waters north of Baffin Island, at the eastern entrance to the Northwest Passage.

2010/04/09: CanWest: Harper’s anti-green agendaWhat if the Harper government’s approach to the environment — rolling back previous safeguards, endlessly delaying regulation of greenhouse gas emissions, failing even to make serious efforts at conservation — doesn’t simply reflect indifference, neglect, or a single-minded attempt to shelter the lucrative and polluting tarsands? What if the real, unstated, goal is to withdraw the federal government from environmental regulation altogether and hand full responsibility to the provinces? Green Party leader Elizabeth May, who has followed federal environmental policy for decades and over the course of several governments, is convinced that is the prime minister’s end game.

2010/04/05: TMoS: Burying Our Heads in the Sands of Climate ChangeStephen Harper claims to stand for Canada. Maybe yesterday’s Canada but he sure doesn’t stand for tomorrow’s. Climate change has already begun to arrive in Canada. If you don’t see it, that’s because you’re not looking, not thinking. It might also be that your awareness of global warming and how it will shape Canada is stunted by the absolute dearth of information on the subject coming from the Harper regime.

2010/04/05: TimesTranscript: When Hillary came to town[…]Once a leader in climate-change battle, we’ve become a laggard, heartily refusing to embrace the science behind global warming. We’ve muzzled our environmental experts, cut their funding, and threatened to ruin their careers. We’ve pursued tar sands development with giddy abandon and paid mere lip service to the potential locked in clean, renewable energy development.[…]Clinton’s rebukes were reminders that the Obama administration is, essentially, progressive (even if, in some critics’ eyes, only in name), and that it plays well with others only if those others embrace the Great Society principles of the last century’s middle decades. But Harper comes from a different, less forgiving, less inclusive time in Canadian history.

2010/04/06: CanWest: Tories failing on own oilsands report cardA year after promising to make oilsands development more socially and environmentally responsible, the Alberta government has given itself a report card showing no progress on many key goals such as reducing provincial greenhouse gas emissions. Just two of 21 short-term goals — to be accomplished by 2012 — have been completed, according to a report on the progress of a comprehensive oilsands management plan released with great fanfare in February 2009. Longer-term goals, to be met over the next 20 years, have seen little or no progress, while other short-term goals have seen intermediate progress, says the report, posted online earlier this year.

2010/04/06: CanWest: Alberta lowers expectations for climate-change fundThe provincial government has slashed its expectations for making Alberta’s biggest carbon producers pay into a climate-change fund. While the industrial sector bought $85.3 million worth of emissions fund credits in 2008-09, the province expects to collect just $78 million this year The estimate, outlined in Alberta Environment’s 2010-11 budget, is nearly $20 million lower than expectations set out for 2009-10, although last year’s final figures have not been tallied. “It’s not an exact science because it really depends on what choices industry makes,” Alberta Environment spokesman Chris Bourdeau said Tuesday. Essentially, Alberta companies that produce more than 100,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide and fail to reduce their emissions by 12 per cent, are expected to pay $15 per tonne. Alternatively, they could purchase power offsets by buying wind power or other renewable energy. Or they could improve their facilities to decrease emissions. About 100 companies meet the criteria to pay into the carbon fund, which in turn is supposed to finance new environmental technology.

2010/04/07: CBC: Appliance power drain not well-known to OntariansThe majority of Ontarians are in the dark about just how much electricity consumption their home electronic appliances are responsible for, a new survey suggests. According to the Ontario Power Authority, devices such as computers, printers and VCRs can account for 15 per cent of a home’s annual electricity usage. But a poll conducted for the agency by Harris-Decima suggests that three in four Ontario residents aren’t aware of the drain household electronic appliances can have, even when they’re shut off.

2010/04/05: CBC: N.S. biomass energy project plannedNova Scotia Power and NewPage Port Hawkesbury are planning a 60-megawatt biomass project that could produce three per cent of the province’s electricity. The two companies say only sustainable methods will be used, and tree stumps, tops and branches will be left on the forest floor. They hope to have the co-generation facility running by late 2012.

2010/04/10: Rabble: Alberta First Nations take legal stand on tar sandsTwo more Alberta First Nations are seeking the assistance of the Supreme Court of Canada in defending their Aboriginal and Treaty rights in the face of mounting oil sands development in Alberta. The Supreme Court of Canada has granted intervenor status to Duncan’s First Nation (DFN) and Horse Lake First Nation (HLFN), in a case that may have major legal implications for the development of oil sands, pipelines, oil sands infrastructure projects and other major projects.[…]This summer, the Supreme Court will hear conflicting arguments and views of First Nations, governments and industry in the Rio Tinto Alcan Inc. v. the Carrier Sekani Tribal Council case. The case will address the question of whether regulatory boards and tribunals, such as the National Energy Board (NEB) and Alberta’s Energy Conservation and Resources Board (ECRB), have a duty to decide whether the Crown adequately consulted and accommodated First Nations’ concerns before granting approvals for resource development, including concerns about past infringements of Aboriginal and Treaty rights.

2010/04/05: NYT: U.S. Sued Over Nuclear Waste FeesSixteen utilities and a trade association sued the Energy Department on Monday to halt the government’s collection of nuclear waste disposal fees, arguing that the country no longer had a disposal plan after ruling out Yucca Mountain, Nev., as a repository. The utilities, which filed the lawsuit in the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, jointly pay about $750 million a year — amounting to a tenth of a cent per kilowatt hour — into the fund.

2010/04/06: NYT:GW: Industry Groups Challenge EPA’s Reconsideration of ‘Johnson Memo’A coalition of industry groups has asked a federal appeals court to review U.S. EPA’s policy for when it plans to begin regulating greenhouse gases from stationary sources. Groups including coal, mining and agricultural interests Friday petitioned (pdf) the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia to review EPA’s policy detailing when the agency must regulate the heat-trapping emissions from industrial facilities like power plants, oil refineries and other sources. EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson laid out that timeline last Monday…

2010/04/09: PhysOrg: Natural gas potential assessed in Eastern MediterraneanAn estimated 122 trillion cubic feet (tcf) (mean estimate) of undiscovered, technically recoverable natural gas are in the Levant Basin Province, located in the Eastern Mediterranean region. Technically recoverable resources are those producible using currently available technology and industry practices. This is the first U.S. Geological Survey assessment of this basin to identify potentially extractable resources.

2010/04/05: PhysOrg: 3 Questions: David MacKay on renewable energyDavid MacKay (pronounced mac-EYE), a professor of physics at the University of Cambridge, UK, was recently appointed to a three-year term as chief scientific advisor to the UK’s Department of Energy and Climate Change. In an April 1 talk at MIT, he described what specifically would be required to shift the world’s energy use entirely to non-carbon emitting sources.

2010/04/06: PlanetArk: Natural Gas Output Overestimated, Shale BlamedThe U.S. Energy Information Administration is revamping the way it calculates domestic natural gas production after it overestimated output from key producer states Texas and Louisiana, an agency official said on Monday. Rapid changes to U.S. natural gas output involving a wave of new small producers of shale gas made it difficult to get an accurate picture of the market, said Gary Long, acting director of the reserves and production division of the agency’s oil and gas office. U.S. natural gas data is being watched perhaps closer than ever as a drilling technique known as hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” has led to excitement about the potential of vast new supplies of the relatively clean burning fuel from New York to Louisiana. Fracking, which gets to natural gas deposits associated with shale, has helped boost U.S. reserves of the fuel by a third since 2006, according to the EIA. The EIA, the statistics arm of the Department of Energy, found that some of its output numbers were inflated in the monthly release, known as the 914 report, Long said.

2010/04/06: CBC: Lasers could spark clean nuclear powerAn international team of scientists is looking at a new way of creating energy from nuclear fusion, a process that could result in no radioactivity, produce little pollution and provide a cheap, abundant source of electricity.[…]“The key is a very carefully controlled extremely short laser pulse essential for ignition. The pulse would ignite a fuel made of ordinary hydrogen and boron-11,” said Hora. “The idea of a hydrogen and boron fusion reaction is interesting because it wouldn’t cause neutron production. Neutrons are a problem because they generate radioactivity,” he said.

2010/04/06: PhysOrg: A smart way to charge upElectromobility makes sense only if car batteries are charged using electricity from renewable energy sources. But the supply of green electricity is not always adequate. An intelligent charging station can help, by adapting the recharging times to suit energy supply and network capacity.

P.S. Recent postings can be found in the week archive and the ancient postings can be accessed here, which should open to this.

“The casual reader might have the impression that there are real doubts about whether emissions can be reduced without inflicting severe damage on the economy. In fact, once you filter out the noise generated by special-interest groups, you discover that there is widespread agreement among environmental economists that a market-based program to deal with the threat of climate change — one that limits carbon emissions by putting a price on them — can achieve large results at modest, though not trivial, cost.” -Paul Krugman